Cecilie Gamst Berg in today's SCMP has an article on racism in China. At first I was going to use it as a talking point on this little discussed side of Chinese life and suggest the more homogenous a population the more likely it is to be racist. I have reproduced the full article below the fold. But, and you know there was a but, there were two parts that stand out...for the wrong reasons.

Firstly, discussing the racist outpourings when Condi Rice recently visited China:

Dr Rice deserves to be attacked for her country's foreign policy and for her own questionable taste in employer. Why would a black woman want to get mixed up with the Republicans at all? But devoting an entire rant to the two things she cannot help - her appearance and her sex - is just scoring easy points.

Meanwhile, Dr Rice is a woman of many accomplishments. Let us hope that the ability to read Chinese is not one of them.

Convenient channel for public fury

The first political discussion I had in Putonghua was in Shanghai, in 1989. I was having lunch with some money changers when some Africans walked past the restaurant. The money changers started making strange animal noises and grimaces. Seeing my puzzled expression, they explained: "They are black devils." In broken Chinese, I asked the head money changer why he did not like blacks. "They are dirty. Their skin is black because they don't wash."
"How about Mike Tyson, do you like him?" I asked. "Oh yes," came the reply. "But he's black." "Yes, but he is American black." The whole table erupted in laughter.

That episode and many similar experiences have led me to believe that racism in China is not so much about skin colour as about what people perceive to be the haves and the have-nots.

I was, therefore, surprised by the vitriolic attacks on US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, posted on the popular mainland website Sina.com, before her state visit to China. Reminiscent of the Cultural Revolution, the rants were full of racist terms like "black devil", "black pig" and "black bitch". Another word frequently used was "ugly".

To my knowledge, Colin Powell - who is also of African origin - never got the same treatment. But then, he is a man. Interestingly, most of the racist slurs on the website had to do with Dr Rice being a woman. Indeed, it seemed that users of the website had the biggest problem with her being a woman and "ugly" - her colour was thrown in almost as an afterthought. And, inevitably, because a woman was the target, the word "whore" was trotted out.

Dr Rice deserves to be attacked for her country's foreign policy and for her own questionable taste in employer. Why would a black woman want to get mixed up with the Republicans at all? But devoting an entire rant to the two things she cannot help - her appearance and her sex - is just scoring easy points.

I do not think the Chinese are any more or less racist than other people. I believe the attacks on Dr Rice - supposedly carried out by members of China's "elite" - have everything to do with a repressed population's need to lash out at someone, to shout out some kind of protest, knowing that there will be no repercussions from the government.

In a country where mature political discussion is not only discouraged, but can be downright dangerous, hurling insults at people for reasons that bear no relevance to what they do or stand for has always been a safe way to vent built-up anger.

Indeed, it is tempting to suggest that Beijing secretly encourages this kind of "letting off steam" - as it has been doing with the anti-Japanese protests and violence, and as it did after the bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade.

The Chinese government is busy enough keeping an eye on everything that goes on in the country. I do not think, as some have suggested, that officials should interfere with this kind of cyber-nonsense, even if they did find it offensive. Whoever posted the messages will one day look in the mirror and start pondering the word "ugly".

Meanwhile, Dr Rice is a woman of many accomplishments. Let us hope that the ability to read Chinese is not one of them.

Cecilie Gamst Berg is a Hong Kong-based writer